I've been a proud participant in all 3 of the "Hands Across The Sand" demonstrations because I'm a strong opponent of drilling for oil in the Gulf of Mexico, and especially anywhere near Florida's fragile coastline. I've also attended all of the Press Conferences for all 3 of these events.
I noticed a marked difference in yesterday's "Hands Across The Sand" protest from the one that occurred just one short year ago.
Last June when hundreds of people joined hands on St. Petersburg Beach to protest drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, the Deepwater Horizon was gushing millions of gallons of "sweet crude" into the Gulf. At any time during the day or night, you could turn on a TV and see the oil uncontrollably gushing onto the ocean floor. This disaster was front and center every day for 4 months.
A year ago at the Press Conference, we heard the manager of the Tradewinds Hotel tell us of the huge loss in business that his hotel had suffered as a result of the perception that oil was on the beaches all over Florida, and not just in the Panhandle. I made a mental note of the numbers of hotel guests around the pools and on the beach and it was remarkably low for the summer season.
A year ago I noticed that there were many more Politicians in attendance at the Press Conference at the Tradewinds Hotel in St. Petersburg than there were in attendance yesterday. Last year, they all wanted to speak out against that gusher that we saw on our TV every day. A year ago, there were also a greater number of media representatives in attendance at the Press Conference.
Yesterday, the Tradewinds Hotel was extremely crowded. I noticed a huge difference in the activity level at the hotel compared to last June. The pools were packed, the rental concessions of surfboards and other water toys were doing a brisk business, and the beach was packed with swimmers and walkers. Walking through the hotel this year, I saw several signs for Convention Groups who were staying at the Hotel.
Those convention groups weren't there last year, and the pools and the beach weren't packed last year, either--even though there wasn't a drop of oil on St. Petersburg Beach.
Simply the perception that there might be an oil problem was enough to keep those groups and tourists away.
So, what has happened in the past year to make offshore drilling safer? Nothing--absolutely nothing.
We just don't talk about it daily. We don't have 24/7 live footage of the gusher on our TV's. We've moved on to the Casey Anthony trial.
What has happened in the past year to make the tourists come back? Probably a combination of advertising that "the coast is clear," and no media coverage of the oil slicks in the Gulf (which are still rising up from the ocean floor and are being spotted out off of the coast of Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and Florida--but they aren't reporting it on the news often, or at all.
But, the single biggest factor is that we don't have a leaking well that is in the news daily.
As Americans, we don't seem to pay much attention to History any more. Out of sight, out of mind....Thus, we can expect to be doomed repeat the same mistakes.
I awoke yesterday to new headlines in the paper that Sen. Mike Haridopolos and Gov. Rick Scott want to bring oil drilling back for approval in State waters (inside of 9 miles from the Coast). Really!
Florida has 825 miles of sandy beaches and 8,500 miles of tidally influenced coastline. More than 950,000 Floridians make their living from jobs relating to tourism and our coastal waters. In 2008, visitors spent $65.2 billion dollars and Florida collected $3.9 billion dollars in total tourism tax revenues. As we saw from the disaster a year ago, we have a large marine fisheries business, restaurants, and hotels that depend upon clean water. What part of those facts and figures don't Mike Haridopolos and Rick Scott understand?
Why would we ever want to risk all of that revenue and all of those jobs—both are irreplaceable—now and forever! Certainly, one year isn't long enough to forget how badly our economy was affected by this disaster?
Don't tell me that we need to drill in the Gulf "to reduce our dependency on foreign oil," or "for our National Security"--unless you are going to "nationalize" those wells and make them owned by the U.S. Government (say, for example to supply the strategic government reserve of oil). But, that will never happen because these well they want to drill won't be owned or controlled by the U.S. Government, but instead will be owned by an international oil company which has a singular goal--to sell the oil to whomever will pay the highest price for it.
If you can guarantee me that the oil drilled in the Gulf will be sold solely in the U.S. and not sold on the world market for a higher price, and if you can convince me that the industry has instituted real safety measures instead of relying upon the same old technology that has been used for the last 30 years with a lousy safety record--then I might listen. Until then, we will only get the shaft in this whole scenario.
All we will get will be the mess. We'll have to clean up the mess. We'll have to suffer the losses of income and tax revenues while the oil companies simply sell their oil to the highest bidder. Sounds fair.
It's time to pass a Florida Constitutional Amendment to prohibit drilling off the coast. Our short term memory problem demands nothing less....
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